Restraining Government in America and Around the World

Bush Was a Statist, not a Conservative

A former White House speechwriter, Mark Thiessen, has jumped to the defense of his former boss, writing for the Washington Post that George W. Bush “established a conservative record without parallel.” Even by the loose standards of Washington, that is a jaw-dropping assertion. I’ve been explaining for years that Bush was a big-government advocate, even writing a column back in 2007 for the Washington Examiner pointing out that Clinton had a much better economic record from a free-market perspective. I also groused to the Wall Street Journal the following year about Bush’s dismal performance.

“Bush doesn’t have a conservative legacy” on the economy, said Dan Mitchell, a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute. “Tax-rate reductions are the only positive achievement, and those are temporary … Everything else that has happened has been permanent, and a step toward more statism.” He cited big increases in the federal budget, along with continuing subsidies in agriculture and transportation, new Medicare drug benefits, and increased federal intervention in education and housing.

Let’s review the economic claims in Mr. Thiessen’s column. He writes:

The thrust of their argument is that Bush expanded the size of government dramatically — and they are absolutely right. Federal spending grew significantly on Bush’s watch, and this is without question a black mark on his record. (Federal spending also grew dramatically under Ronald Reagan, though he was dealt a Democratic Congress, whereas Bush had six years of Republican leadership on Capitol Hill.)

Since federal spending almost doubled in Bush’s eight years, it’s tempting to summarily dismiss this assertion, but let’s cite a few additional facts just in case someone is under the illusion that Bush was on the side of taxpayers. And let’s specifically compare Bush to Reagan since Mr. Thiessen seems to think they belong in the same ball park. This article by Veronique de Rugy is probably a good place to begin since it compares all Presidents and shows that Bush was a big spender compared to Reagan…and to Clinton. But the most damning evidence comes from the OMB’s Historical Tables, which show that Reagan reduced both entitlements and domestic discretionary spending as a share of GDP during his two terms. Bush (and I hope nobody is suprised) increased the burden of spending in both of these categories.That’s the spending side of the ledger. Let’s now turn to tax policy, where Thiessen writes:

Bush enacted the largest tax cuts in history — and unlike my personal hero, Ronald Reagan, he never signed a major tax increase into law.

Using the most relevant measures, such as changes in marginal tax rates or comparing the impact of each President’s tax changes on revenues as a share of GDP, Bush’s tax cuts are far less significant than the Reagan tax cuts. But there presumably is some measure, perhaps nominal revenues over some period of years, showing the Bush tax cuts are larger, so we’ll let that claim slide. The more relevant issue to address is the legacy of each President. Reagan did sign several tax increases after his 1981 Economic Recovery Tax Act, but the cumulative effect of those unfortunate compromises was relatively modest compared to the positive changes in his first year. When he left office, he bequeathed to the nation a tax code with meaningful and permanent tax rate reductions. The Bush tax cuts, by contrast, expire at the end of this year, and virtually all of the pro-growth provisions will disappear. This doesn’t mean Bush’s record on taxes was bad, but it certainly does not compare to the Gipper’s. But what about other issue, such as trade? Driessen writes:

Bush enacted free-trade agreements with 17 nations, more than any president in history.

Those are some positive steps, to be sure, but they are offset by the protectionist moves on steel and lumber. I’m not a trade expert, so I don’t know if Bush was a net negative or a net positive, but at best it’s a muddled picture and Driessen certainly did not present the full story. And speaking of sins of omission, his section on health care notes:

Bush created Health Savings Accounts – the most important free-market health-care reform in a generation. And he courageously stood up to Congressional Democrats when they sought to use the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) to nationalize health care — and defeated their efforts.

Conveniently missing from this analysis, though, is any mention of the utterly irresponsible prescription drug entitlement. There is no doubt that Bush’s net impact on healthcare was to saddle America with more statism. Indeed, I’d be curious to see some long-run numbers on the impact of Bush’s prescription drug entitlement and the terrible plan Obama just imposed on America. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that the negative fiscal impact of both plans was comparable. Shifting gears, let’s now turn to education policy, where Driessen writes:

Bush won a Supreme Court ruling declaring school vouchers constitutional and enacted the nation’s first school-choice program in the District of Columbia.

Bush deserves some credit on school choice, but his overall education record is characterized by more spending and centralization. Thanks in part to his no-bureaucrat-left-behind plan, the budget for the Department of Education grew signicantly and federal spending on elementary, secondary, and vocational education more than doubled. Equally worrisome, federal bureaucrats gained more control over education policy. Finally, Thiessen brags about Bush’s record on Social Security reform:

Bush fought valiantly for a conservative priority no American president had ever dared to touch: Social Security reform, with private accounts that would have given millions of our citizens a stake in the free market system. His effort failed, but he deserves credit from conservatives for staking his second term in office on this effort.

This is an area where the former President does deserve some credit. So even though the White House’s failure to ever put forth a specific proposal was rather frustrating, at least Bush did talk about real reform and the country would be better off today if something had been enacted.

This addresses all the economic claims in Driessen’s article, but we can’t give Bush a complete grade until we examine some of the other issues that were missing from the column. On regulatory issues, the biggest change implemented during the Bush year was probably Sarbanes-Oxley – a clear example of regulatory overkill. Another regulatory change, which turned out to be a ticking time bomb, was the expansion of the “affordable-lending” requirements for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

And speaking of Fannie and Freddie, no analysis of Bush’s record would be complete without a discussion of bailouts. Without getting too deep in the issue, the most galling part of what Bush did was not necessarily recapitalizing the banking system (a good chunk of which was required by government deposit insurance anyhow), but rather the way it happened. During the savings & loan bailout 20 years ago, at least incompentent executives and negligent shareholders were wiped out. Government money was used, but only to pay off depositors and/or to pay healthy firms to absorb bankrupt institutions. Bush and Paulson, by contrast, exacerbated all the moral hazard issues by resucing the executives and shareholders who helped create the mess. Last but not least, let’s not forget that Bush got the ball rolling on auto-industry bailouts.

If all of this means Bush is a “conservative record without parallel,” then Barack Obama must be the second coming of Ronald Reagan.

110 Responses

[…] the cause of limited government, but there are still plenty of corrupt big spenders as well as some Bush-style “compassionate conservatives” who think buying votes with other people’s money somehow makes one a caring […]

[…] the cause of limited government, but there are still plenty of corrupt big spenders as well as some Bush-style “compassionate conservatives” who think buying votes with other people’s money somehow makes one a caring […]

[…] the cause of limited government, but there are still plenty of corrupt big spenders as well as some Bush-style “compassionate conservatives” who think buying votes with other people’s money somehow makes one a caring […]

[…] the cause of limited government, but there are still plenty of corrupt big spenders as well as some Bush-style “compassionate conservatives” who think buying votes with other people’s money somehow makes one a caring […]

[…] the cause of limited government, but there are still plenty of corrupt big spenders as well as some Bush-style “compassionate conservatives” who think buying votes with other people’s money somehow makes one a caring […]

[…] sentence. The former Pennsylvania Senator is not a fiscal conservative, having supported all the wasteful spending of the Bush years. If he does well, Mitt Romney will be very happy since Santorum will split the anti-Mitt vote for a […]

[…] My problem with Obama is that he hasn’t fixed any of the problems. Instead, he has kept in place all of the bad policies – and in some cases made them worse. Indeed, I challenge anyone to identify a meaningful difference between the economic policy of Obama and the economic policy of Bush. […]

[…] My problem with Obama is that he hasn’t fixed any of the problems. Instead, he has kept in place all of the bad policies – and in some cases made them worse. Indeed, I challenge anyone to identify a meaningful difference between the economic policy of Obama and the economic policy of Bush. […]

[…] My problem with Obama is that he hasn’t fixed any of the problems. Instead, he has kept in place all of the bad policies – and in some cases made them worse. Indeed, I challenge anyone to identify a meaningful difference between the economic policy of Obama and the economic policy of Bush. […]

[…] hasten to add, that Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum would be any better. Both of them seem closer to Bush than Reagan, so it’s not clear they would make any substantive changes in the burden of the […]

[…] hasten to add, that Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum would be any better. Both of them seem closer to Bush than Reagan, so it’s not clear they would make any substantive changes in the burden of the […]

[…] hasten to add, that Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum would be any better. Both of them seem closer to Bush than Reagan, so it’s not clear they would make any substantive changes in the burden of the […]

[…] And that’s what’s happening. Indeed, the good news is that policymakers have proposed several budget plans that would shrink the burden of spending as a share of GDP. It’s refreshing to debate the features of several good plans (rather than comparing the warts in the competing plans during the big-government Bush years). […]

[…] And that’s what’s happening. Indeed, the good news is that policymakers have proposed several budget plans that would shrink the burden of spending as a share of GDP. It’s refreshing to debate the features of several good plans (rather than comparing the warts in the competing plans during the big-government Bush years). […]

[…] Those problems existed before he took office. Instead, he gets a bad grade because he continued the statist policies of his predecessor. Rate this: Share this:PrintEmailFacebookTwitterMoredeliciousDiggFarkLinkedInRedditStumbleUponLike […]

Are you joking? You’re still trying to prop up Oblaba with the Bush-bash?

Are you idiots ever going to explain Peloser and Harry Fraud up to this very moment with no budgets and their fingerprints on every corrupt action in the last 10 years (including Bushes last two and don’t forget Bawney and Dud on Fannie/Freddie).

[…] say Reagan and Clinton were comparatively frugal, and we can also say that Nixon, LBJ, and Bush 43 were relatively profligate. As for Obama, I think his tugboat is pushing in the wrong direction, […]

[…] say Reagan and Clinton were comparatively frugal, and we can also say that Nixon, LBJ, and Bush 43 were relatively profligate. As for Obama, I think his tugboat is pushing in the wrong direction, […]

[…] My problem with Obama is that he hasn’t fixed any of the problems. Instead, he has kept in place all of the bad policies – and in some cases made them worse. Indeed, I challenge anyone to identify a meaningful difference between the economic policy of Obama and the economic policy of Bush. […]

[…] hasten to add, that Mitt Romney or Rick Santorum would be any better. Both of them seem closer to Bush than Reagan, so it’s not clear they would make any substantive changes in the burden of the […]

[…] Barroso’s comments, in other words, are akin to an American leftist saying that Republicans shouldn’t attack Obama’s statist agenda because Bush supported the same big-government policies when he was President. […]

[…] My problem with Obama is that he hasn’t fixed any of the problems. Instead, he has kept in place all of the bad policies – and in some cases made them worse. Indeed, I challenge anyone to identify a meaningful difference between the economic policy of Obama and the economic policy of Bush. […]

[…] believe in free markets and small government, it’s easy to get depressed. We suffered through eight years of wasteful spending and misguided intervention under Bush, and now we’re enduring four years of additional spending and red tape under […]

[…] Many people equate Republicans with limited government, so you have to explain that there’s a giant difference between the views of the Cato Institute and the decisions of statists like Richard Nixon or George W. Bush. […]

[…] government that Obama was the right choice, he should have argued that Romney would be another big-government statist like Bush. That’s a very compelling argument, as you can see from this list of Romney […]

[…] doesn’t mean, of course, that Romney would solve the problem. He could be another big-government statist like Bush. Indeed, I think his failure to articulate a pro-freedom message is one reason why he seems to be […]

[…] for someone to blame, allow me to suggest George Bush and Karl Rove. By deliberately choosing bad policy in hopes of gaining short-run political advantage, they created the medium-run conditions that […]

[…] for someone to blame, allow me to suggest George Bush and Karl Rove. By deliberately choosing bad policy in hopes of gaining short-run political advantage, they created the medium-run conditions that […]

[…] say Reagan and Clinton were comparatively frugal, and we can also say that Nixon, LBJ, and Bush 43 were relatively profligate. As for Obama, I think his tugboat is pushing in the wrong direction, […]

[…] What matters to me is whether DeMint will guide Heritage in the right direction. At times in recent history, it seems Heritage lost sight of its Reaganite roots. The organization, for instance, got some unfavorable publicity for supporting healthcare mandates (for friends of Heritage, this leftist video is very painful to watch). The Heritage Foundation also was far too timid last decade about criticizing Bush’s reckless record of excessive federal spending. […]

[…] and believe in free markets and small government, it’s easy to get depressed. We suffered through eight years of wasteful spending and misguided intervention under Bush, and now we’re enduring four years of additional spending and red tape under […]

[…] and believe in free markets and small government, it’s easy to get depressed. We suffered through eight years of wasteful spending and misguided intervention under Bush, and now we’re enduring four years of additional spending and red tape under […]

[…] Yes, Obama has increased the burden of government spending, raised tax rates, and created more dependency, but there’s nothing particularly special about Obama’s tenure that makes him different from other statist Presidents such as Nixon, Carter, and Bush. […]

[…] Yes, Obama has increased the burden of government spending, raised tax rates, and created more dependency, but there’s nothing particularly special about Obama’s tenure that makes him different from other statist Presidents such as Nixon, Carter, and Bush. […]

[…] The big drop occurred at the end of the Bush years. Some of that drop was cyclical, caused by the recession. And some of it was presumably the cumulative impact of Bush’s big-government policies. […]

[…] The big drop occurred at the end of the Bush years. Some of that drop was cyclical, caused by the recession. And some of it was presumably the cumulative impact of Bush’s big-government policies. […]

I was always slightly humored by my liberal friends’ assertion that Bush was conservative. (They meaning it as ab opprobrium of course). The only thing that Bush did that was arguably somewhat conservative was the tax cuts which are now gone anyway. (Unless you consider invading a country that posed no threat to us “conservative”. Bush was a neoconservative – which shares little with true conservativatism other than part of the name. Neoconservatism shares much more with the Left them it does with conservatism.

[…] The big drop occurred at the end of the Bush years. Some of that drop was cyclical, caused by the recession. And some of it was presumably the cumulative impact of Bush’s big-government policies. […]

[…] Yes, Obama has increased the burden of government spending, raised tax rates, and created more dependency, but there’s nothing particularly special about Obama’s tenure that makes him different from other statist Presidents such as Nixon, Carter, and Bush. […]

[…] is right, though I would point out that there’s a huge difference between statist Republicans like Bush, who have dominated the national GOP in recent decades, and freedom-oriented Republicans such as […]

[…] is right, though I would point out that there’s a huge difference between statist Republicans like Bush, who have dominated the national GOP in recent decades, and freedom-oriented Republicans such as […]

[…] He points out that both Reagan and Obama inherited very weak economies. But that’s where the similarity ends. Reagan pushed an agenda of free markets and small government while Obama doubled down on Bush’s statism. […]

[…] I actually agree. That’s because the burden of government spending jumped significantly during the Bush years and the regulatory state became more oppressive. All things considered, Bush was a statist. […]

[…] I actually agree. That’s because the burden of government spending jumped significantly during the Bush years and the regulatory state became more oppressive. All things considered, Bush was a statist. […]

[…] have boosted the burden of government when they took office (President George H.W. Bush and President George W. Bush are two dismal examples of this phenomenon). But they at least pretended to be vaguely in favor of […]

[…] By the way, the National Party is supposed to be on the right side of the political spectrum, yet this politician wants to blame mining companies even though it was the government that squandered so much money. Makes me wonder if his middle initial is “W“? […]

[…] to wait and see whether Trump chooses wisely, though I’m not holding my breath. We certainly didn’t get any pro-taxpayer shift of policy the last time GOPers were in charge of the White House. And Trump’s commitment to the notion […]